


Sebastian is changing, too.

by mitzvah (Melting)



Series: (my black butler interpretation) [3]
Category: Kuroshitsuji | Black Butler
Genre: Angst, Canon-typical master/slave dynamics, Ciel is my problematic fav, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-30
Updated: 2015-10-30
Packaged: 2018-04-28 21:20:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,800
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5106134
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Melting/pseuds/mitzvah
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <em>“There is no point in obfuscating your true intentions, my lord.  Your soul will never be judged; you are therefore free to indulge in the sin of wrath, if you so desire, without any fear of consequence.”</em>
</p>
<p>Ciel has just learned that he has the power to cause his demon severe physical pain.  He fervently tries to assure Sebastian that he would never intentionally hurt the demon unjustly.  Sebastian doesn't believe him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sebastian is changing, too.

Sebastian is changing, too.

Following their last intimate conversation (a week before), the butler’s presence at the earl’s side is less consistent.  He appears when he is called, of course, and he serves the meals and brings the mail and dresses the earl, but he doesn’t linger. He doesn’t tease or taunt Ciel.  He doesn’t say much to Ciel about anything, outside that which relates to his work.

And, eventually, the changes in Sebastian’s behavior become more distinct.

One morning, Ciel discovers that all the railings of the stairwells have been meticulously polished overnight.  The chandelier in the foyer brings out such deep, rich tones in the stain of the oak balustrade that Ciel – not usually one for mooning over the architecture of his own house – actually _notices._

Then, upon an excursion into the estate grounds, Ciel notices that the entire exterior of the mansion has been scrubbed clean. The granite and limestone are now white as the clouds reflected in the windows. 

And then there’s the next evening, when Ciel realizes, awestruck, that not only was his most recent choice of reading material repaired overnight, but so was _every_ ageing document in the extensive Phantomhive library.  Hundreds and hundreds of manuscripts, stitched and bound anew.

Under the earl’s ruthless interrogation, Mey-Rin divulges that she and the other staff have been catching glimpses of Sebastian doing the work overnight.

“I’d been about to turn in for the night when I saw ‘im, yes I did!  All by ‘imself in the library by candlelight, yes ‘e was, with ‘is glasses and everything! Was a bloody _miracle_ I didn’t faint at seein’ ‘im in such an intimate state… Oh, excuse me, master, I didn’t mean to say that last bit out loud!”

It is strange for Ciel to imagine Sebastian with a polishing rag scrubbing the railings, Sebastian with a sponge poring over the marble and granite, Sebastian with a needle and thread repairing the library books by candlelight.  But the testimony of his household staff corroborates this story: Sebastian did all of the work by _hand._   No mops, no tools. No demon-magic. Just precise, concentrated effort.

Sebastian is changing, too, and it manifests in these bizarre overnight odysseys of upkeep that, even to Ciel, seem completely unwarranted.

(And a bit unsettling.)

He broaches the subject when Sebastian brings the Funtom Company mail the following morning. “I think you’ll erode away half the manor, if you keep this up.”

“Excuse me, my lord?” responds the butler, with a perfunctory smile and hands clasped behind him.

Ciel shrugs, as he removes his father’s letter opener from the box on the desk and begins slicing open envelopes.  “Just – this overnight work. What’s gotten into you?”

The blade of the letter opener has been sharpened and polished as well, Ciel notes to himself.  It feels like an invasion of privacy, to have such cherished family heirlooms modified without his knowledge or consent.

The butler responds pleasantly, “It is not necessary for me to rest overnight, young master.  Would it not be best to make use of such time?”

“Well… yes, I suppose so… but…” Ciel glances up at Sebastian. Sees the false smile. Returns his gaze to the papers, uncomfortably. He says, in a forced, commanding tone, “I won’t have my butler scrubbing the floors, alright? It’s below your station.”

 “My apologies.  I’ll refrain from doing so in the future, my lord.”

Ciel catches sight of his butler’s reflection in the blade, eyes blood-red and sharp.  “Sebastian,” a heartbeat, and then, “Does this have to do with our discussion the other night?”

When Ciel looks up, his butler’s eyes are still on the blade.

_(“Tenfold the pain a normal human would experience,” Sebastian had said, about demons being physically attacked by the contract-holders.  What is tenfold the pain of a cut from a blade? What is tenfold the pain of a stab wound?)_

Then, Sebastian shuts his eyes, smiles again falsely like the liar he’s always been, and asks, “To which conversation do you refer, young master? You have been quite inquisitive, lately.”

_Damn it._ Ciel’s inner voice growls. _Damn it all._

He places the letter opener back in the decorative case with the velvet lining, and passes the letters – unread – back to his butler.  “Take care of this, Sebastian.” he snaps, glaring at the finance records, “I don’t have the patience for it.”

…

What is tenfold the pain of a slap to the face, from the open palm of a child?

After all, Ciel has slapped his butler before. And it’s not as if he’d held back – he’d known that demons were, in general, particularly immune to physical pain.  So, when trying to channel his anger into what he knew _(thought)_ would be a futile physical attack, Ciel used all his strength.  He’d believed it to be akin to attacking a stone wall.

But what _is_ tenfold the pain of a slap to the face, from the open palm of a child?

Threefold would probably be equal to the pain of a slap to the face from the open palm of an adult.

Sixfold would probably be equal to the pain experienced by a child when slapped by an adult.

Tenfold… would probably feel like a blow to the head from a cricket-bat.

And a slap to the face, from the open palm of a child, is quite an insignificant base amount of physical pain to multiply.

What of a slice from the blade of a letter-opener?

With a snarl, the boy shouts “Damn it!” into the open air.

_Sebastian doesn’t need to be protected._

Ciel’s cane drags for a moment against the loose dirt of the garden, missing the rhythm of his quick pace away from the manor.  He’s going into the garden because he needs to clear his head and, though the pollen probably won’t help much, the distance from the demon might.

And, besides, the garden was his mother’s; this will also calm Ciel.  Even though the garden had been consumed in the fire, the demon’s magic had restored it to its former state, and the new flora continue to bloom in the ashes of their predecessors. Roses, china asters, baby’s breath, poppies…

Two symmetrical blocks of marble, inscribed with his late parents’ names, centered amongst an overflowing collection of lilacs in bloom.

_Damn the demon.  Damn it. Damn him._

He collapses, kneeling in the garden, blissfully alone.

Being near his mother and father clears the dust cloud of moral anxiety that had been settling on his shoulders and in the locks of his hair.  He can rest here, he can sink his bare knees into the soft, damp earth and breathe the air of the garden. There is safety, on this hallowed ground.

(And damn his bastard butler if he so much as _thinks_ about complaining about the inevitable grass-stains in the earl’s socks.)

The letter-opener. The blade sharpened. Why would Sebastian sharpen the blade?

_Sebastian doesn’t need to be protected._

Oh, lord. If Ciel has to start reminding himself of this, he really _has_ gone insane.

_Sebastian_ – _a demon of hell, who is immortal, and eventually going to eat Ciel’s soul – doesn’t need to be protected._

His fingers hold fast to his walking stick, clutched close to his shoulder.  He rests his cheek against the wood.  And this rationalist mantra repeats endlessly in Ciel’s head, as he tries in vain to make sense of it all.  It’s not… it’s not like any rational person would _hurt_ their demon, in the first place.  What would be the point of it?

You contract with this demon to have a task accomplished, but then you sidetrack the monster by physically tormenting it rather than allow it to complete the task? 

Sebastian must have been lying.  That doesn’t… it’s so counter-intuitive…

_“I sincerely hope you continue to believe so, young master.  Else, I’ve damned myself.”_

With that, Ciel can’t shake this feeling like there’s something wrong that he needs to fix, even though he didn’t _do anything_ , there’s nothing to feel so guilty for…

Or… not guilt.  But he feels like it’s his responsibility to right someone else’s wrong.  The same sort of blind, noble intention that has cursed his family for generations.

He stares at his father’s grave. 

It had all made sense, before this.  His parents were taken from the world by evil beings who had to be stopped.  There was nothing but that, nothing but that goal.  At any cost, he would eliminate those responsible for the horror, for the suffering. He would avenge his own forsaken childhood.

The lilac petals tremble in the breeze.

Now… the path is not so clear.

Perhaps…

With a deep breath, eyes trained on the lilacs, Ciel tries to unravel the strange ideas knotted in his chest.  Then, a searching glance up towards his mother’s name engraved in the stone.  The memory of her smile, of her perfume, of her fingers in his hair, of her gentle humming as she held him.

And, normally, Ciel’s reminiscing leads to nightmarish flames and the pain of loss, but…

Not now.

Yes, his eyes have watered, the solitude of the garden allowing tears to spill, but there is no fire in his heart.  His quest for revenge had been founded on a false understanding of his own situation.

It was revenge, because Ciel had believed that he, too, had died in the fire.  He’d believed that his childhood, his future, and his ability to care had all been lost.

But here he is, knees coated in dirt, sobbing empty in the garden, supporting himself with fingers clutched around his cane, and he is worried about _Sebastian,_ of all things.  Not revenge.  Not grief.  Not regret.  Not loneliness.

For some inconceivable reason, all Ciel wants is to prove himself _just_ and _good._   He wants to prove to Sebastian that he won’t _hurt_ him, that he won’t hurt _anyone_ without just cause. 

Ciel has been existentially numb for so long that it is jarring, to suddenly be able to care about this.

This new goal won’t change anything.  It won’t bring his parents back.  It won’t eliminate the forces that hurt Ciel in the first place.  It won’t save his soul from its inevitable destiny in the pit of a demon’s stomach.

But he wants it more than anything.

Through bleary eyes, he stares at the lilacs and tries to keep his breathing steady, still choking out halfhearted curses to himself.

He wants it more than anything.

…

“Moorcock.”  Ciel declares, exasperated and blunt as he tosses off the stuffy suit jacket he’d been wearing for his meeting with Lord Randall at the billiard table.  Lord Randall, after all, is quite exhausting to be around.

The butler, bewildered by his master’s cavalier behavior, responds “Pardon?” as he retrieves the jacket to store it away properly.

“Lord Randall suggested the Moorcock case.” Ciel explains, collapsing into the armchair in the corner of his bedroom. “It went through the courts earlier this year. This fellow, Thompson, contracts for space at a wharf owner’s jetty along the Thames. The ship, named the Moorcock, is damaged by rocks along the riverbed when the tide goes down. Thompson sues the wharfingers.”

Amused, Sebastian asks, “Is Her Majesty entrusting to her guard dog the management of civil cases, now?  It seems below your station, my lord.”

“What? No – this isn’t about _work,_ Sebastian.  Listen,” Ciel shuts his eyes, rubs his forehead in frustration, trying to keep straight the details of the court case he’d only just gone over with the commissioner.  “The courts sided with Thompson.  They ruled that the wharfinger was responsible for making sure the jetty was a safe place for the Moorcock to dock. Even though it wasn’t explicitly stated in the contract, the courts ruled that this provision was _implied_.”

The butler takes the earl’s walking stick and places it in its holder by the door.

“Don’t you get it?” Ciel demands.

“Does the young master wish to begin practicing law?”

“It’s – it’s… oh, quit playing dumb, Sebastian.  It’s a matter of case precedent.” Ciel states, emphatically. “It allows for the existence of _implied terms_ in contract law!”

The butler is checking the time on his pocket watch. “Shall I prepare your bath, my lord?” Sebastian asks, mildly.

“What are you _talking_ about?” Ciel shoots back, agitated, “Are you even listening to me?!”

Startled, the butler replies, “Yes, young master.  But I had the impression that you were thinking aloud, so I may as well prepare the bath in the meantime.”

“I am not ‘thinking aloud’, Sebastian, I’m talking to you!”

“Apologies.” says the butler, clasping his hands behind his back, “Please, continue.  You have my full attention.”

And then, with his demon looking directly at him, Ciel loses his voice for a moment, feeling very small.  Is the demon really this dense?  Does he not realize what Ciel is trying to tell him?  Even with direct eye contact, Ciel gleans nothing about his butler’s thoughts.

_You have my full attention._   What a load of…

“As of recent case precedent, there is… there is reason to believe that…” Oh, he can’t form the words.  Ciel takes a deep breath and breaks eye contact with the demon. “… there is reason to believe that… harming one’s own demon… _would_ be a contract violation, because it is intuitive that the contract implies such harm would be counterproductive for both parties.”

The butler is silent. Ciel doesn’t want to look at him – it’s not as if Sebastian would let any emotion through, anyhow.

Then, Sebastian asks, calmly, “Is _that_ the reason you called on Lord Randall this evening, young master?”

“Yes.”

“Ah. Very well.”

The butler says nothing more, and his eyes are devoid of meaning.  Ciel quickly becomes impatient.  “Well?” he demands, “Is that it, then? It would violate the contract?”

Stiffly, the demon replies, “No, my lord.”

“Well, why not?!”

“Because, my lord, contracts between a human and a demon do not fall under the jurisdiction of the English judiciary.”

“Well…” Ciel lets out, desperately, feeling rather stupid, “well… well, of _course_ they don’t… but…” _but that’s not the point… I’m just trying to explain that I wouldn’t… why I wouldn’t…_

“If-” Sebastian begins to speak, but hesitates. Then, with a sigh, “If the young master was investigating whether there may be some sort of hidden consequence for raising a hand against his servant, then, for the sake of efficacy, I must assure him that no, there is no such consequence.”

It takes a moment for Ciel to process what Sebastian has said.  He stands up out of the armchair, tries to explain himself, “W-wait… wait, that’s not what I was doing, Sebastian…”

“There is no point in obfuscating your true intentions, my lord.  Your soul will never be judged; you are therefore free to indulge in the sin of wrath, if you so desire, without any fear of consequence.”

_“Sebastian!”_ Ciel snaps.

The demon visibly flinches at the harsh tone.  Well, that’s new.

And Ciel doesn’t know what to say. He stares at his butler, just stares, and processes the implications of the demon’s words.

Finally, the boy whispers, “Do you really think so low of me?”

Sebastian averts his eyes.  “My lord, please understand…” he says, quietly, “It has been _centuries_ since I have last endured any significant physical agony.  I don’t have clear memories of the sensation.  Hence, I have fallen victim to a visceral fear of the unknown.  It is deeply troubling.  I do not mean to question your character, my lord, but I’d rather not delay the inevitable.  It only prolongs the dread.”

His butler’s guarded tone sends an empathetic shiver up Ciel’s spine.  Delaying the inevitable sounds awfully familiar, especially with regard to Ciel’s own destiny.  But for Sebastian, to act as if _this_ is inevitable… “Why?  Why are you saying this? It’s as if you _want_ me to…”

“Please, young master. Is it not obvious that I am less efficient with this apprehension weighing on me?”

“No!” Ciel counters, “No, it’s not _obvious,_ Sebastian.  You seem the same as usual!” Oh, that’s a lie.  He’s sensed the change in his butler, but he’d never _once_ considered it in terms of _efficiency._ His butler is not a _machine._  

Ciel crosses the room, past the demon and towards the window, so he doesn’t have to look at him directly.  He can’t look at him.

“Young master, I have taken to compulsively performing menial tasks only to keep my thoughts from devolving into anxious crises.  I had intended to speak to you about this at a more appropriate time, but now seems to be the opportune moment for me to suggest that if you were only to-”

“To _hurt_ you?! You – you want me to…” Ciel’s fingers form fists, “Have you gone _mad?!”_

His demon is speaking faster. “It is more likely than not, that at some point during the course of this contract I will be forced to endure some kind of-”

“I _told_ you, Sebastian! I said I wouldn’t! I said no one should!”

(And why is the butler’s urgent tone escalating so quickly? What is the matter with him? The anxiety is rubbing off on Ciel – Sebastian is his one _constant,_ and for Sebastian to be so unhinged…)

Without taking a breath, the butler continues, “The possibility remains, and I am ill-equipped to cope with that possibility when I have no memory of having experienced it before, a memory with which to steel myself to the possibility of the experience recurring.  My ability to perform my assigned tasks is deteriorating and if you were only to appease this one request-”

“You are _insane._ ” Ciel growls, deliberately facing away from his demon and staring into the black outdoors through the windowpane.

There is a note of hysteria in the demon’s voice. “Young master - it is _unnatural_ for a contracted demon to lack self-control to such an extent as my recent behavior, and I am begging you to assist me in restoring my mental stability.  I am unable to cause myself to feel any physical sensation; I am entirely dependent on your assistance in this matter…”

“All because you don’t trust me! You think I am the type of mongrel who would-”

“Wouldn’t you?!” the demon shouts.

Ciel suddenly realizes that, at some point during this exchange, the demon has placed the ornate handle of the letter opener in the grasp of the earl’s right hand. If Ciel hadn’t cared about the object with such nostalgia for his father, he may have dropped the blade in shock.

For his butler to act so indecorously as to _force_ the weapon into Ciel’s hands… that crosses the line.

He turns around to face Sebastian, who still appears, for the most part, composed.  But the demon’s eyes belie his fragility – let alone his tone of voice, his desperate appeal.

Ciel looks hard at his demon.  He holds the handle of the letter-opener with his fingertips, not with his fist.  _It is a tool, not a weapon._ He lifts it, with the blade facing the bed and away from himself and the butler.  “What kind of person do you think I am?”

The demon looks away and replies, low, tense, “My apologies, young master. That was uncalled for.”

“I’ve said, over and over again, that to torture another for sadistic reasons is something that I find absolutely morally reprehensible.  But for some reason, that doesn’t get through to you.  I mean,” Ciel muses, “I’d noticed you were acting differently, Sebastian, but I had no idea there was so much you were hiding.  This isn’t like you-”

“As a rule, my lord,” Sebastian interrupts, staring at the floor, “ _all_ humans who learn of the punishment clause of the contract _will_ make use of it within the first twenty-four hours.  There are no exceptions, to my knowledge.”

“But it’s been a week,” says Ciel, immediately.  Then, “… oh.”

The demon lifts his eyes.

“Oh, _Sebastian,_ it’s been a _week._ ”

A week of the demon serving in terror, waiting for this torturous inevitability.  Unprepared in every way for the moment his master chose to strike.

“Young master,” whispers the demon, “I implore you to allow me to reacquaint myself with the sensation of pain.  It will put my mind at ease.  You have my full consent in the matter.”

“You’re terrified,” Ciel observes. “You’re utterly terrified.”

The butler grits his teeth, but says nothing, watching Ciel.

_Terrified… and mortified.  Completely humiliated by his own prostration under the weight of human fear._

Ciel, with deliberate steps, sets down the blade on the bedside table.

Desperate, and yet still as restrained as he can manage, the demon cuts in, “No – no, master, _please…”_

Resolved, the earl says, “I’ve seen too many people I care about suffer.  Not you, Sebastian.  Not ever.  Not by my hand.”  He turns to make eye contact, and says firmly “That is the end of it.”

The butler is still.  Ciel moves past him, to return to the armchair so that they can resume their evening rituals.  When Ciel is seated for a few moments and the butler still hasn’t moved, he stares pointedly at Sebastian.

“So…” the demon breathes, “you would have me suffer the ceaseless terror, instead.” 

There is an element of disbelief in those words, but, more potently, there is rage.  Fury at himself for his weakness, at his master for the boy’s stubbornness. At the situation.  At the spectacle of his own degradation.

“Come here, Sebastian.”

The demon is shaking – physically trembling – as he comes forward to kneel in front of the earl, to resume his tasks, to remove the boy’s shoes.  It is the dissonance between the tempest inside the man and the shackles of the contract.

One shoe is removed. A deadness is settling in Sebastian’s eyes, a resignation, as he tries to control his physical form and suppress the hysteria.

Ciel reaches out, takes the man’s face in his small hands, gently.  Sebastian stops what he was doing, holds still, but the trembling begins again.

“I _will_ earn your trust,” murmurs Ciel.

The demon stares back with the ferocity of a caged animal.

Mind full of lilac petals and resolve, Ciel presses a kiss to the demon’s forehead. Sebastian doesn’t make a sound, suffocating under the emotional tumult.

And then Ciel sinks down from the chair and holds him.

(Like this, hours pass, on the hard floor by the armchair.  Ciel’s fingers guided by memories of his mother, leaving comforting caresses as fit to soothe a frightened child.  Sebastian submits, even leans in to the touch.  But the demon’s eyes are shut tight, jaw set, still shivering intermittently in the child’s arms.  And for a very long while, late into the night, Ciel’s demon doesn’t breathe.  Not once.)

**Author's Note:**

> I hope you guys like this chapter. I'm not as confident about it as I was the last two, but I think it's better to publish something imperfect than to keep agonizing over editing it, indefinitely.
> 
> I tried really hard and I hope it worked out! Please let me know what you thought in the comments, it really means so much to me to hear feedback from you guys! I appreciate you all so much!


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